Search

The sun is out, the weather is warm but not too warm, the humidity is low and I got my run on today…I got it in!!! Today is a good day. And last night I had a good evening, too. I shared my evening with the lovely beauties I’m grateful to call my friends. My relationships with them are so powerful and with little friction. We sipped on wine and shared laughter over topics of relationships, travel, engagements, injuries, and wildly inappropriate subject matters. The dialogue nurtured me as I have missed these women immensely. I swear these friends of mine eat sunshine. We can discuss terrible and beautiful things that have happened to us and to others. We can also discuss world events that are equally terrible and beautiful, and we do so in such a manner of grace and patience with sober awareness paired with frivolity. These women help me explore the depths of myself I wouldn’t otherwise know. They help me see a world through a different lens and I want to give them a shout out and say thank you.

I want to say thank you to these beauties for a myriad of reasons. One of which is kind of my mantra and I’ll get to that. But to travel somewhere 2,200+ miles away from home and to luck into a group of women who not only speak my mantra, but live it…are you shitting me? This is not common practice. I believe most people peacock 24/7 and I’m not trying to sound pessimistic there…more like I’m finally a realist. More often than not people speak words crafted by their bitter tongues that speak boilerplate bullshit…But these women, nah…they’re real.

I always find that when I’m with these women we find ourselves in a natural rhythm of conversation. Their passion and excitement flows from their tongues like the wine we pour in our glasses. Their eyes sparkle and radiate when they divulge new news! I love these women unconditionally because they don’t encourage whining. They don’t suggest that you have to explain yourself and what you’re doing with your life. Instead, they propose solutions; they suggest that you throw yourself in unknown territory without a predetermined plan. They encourage strength, independence, and freedom from the insecurities that we tend to build in our heads. If there’s friction they want to help you sand it down. They speak Valerie. They defy the status quo and don’t explain why. They just do it. They are genuinely themselves. They are authentic. And they don’t apologize. Helllllooo, can you tell why I love them?

One of our topics in the middle of our wildly inappropriate conversations was about my hip. My good ol’ right hip. They encouraged me to accept my fate and have surgery. So let’s discuss the deets.

Granted, I ran today…but oh man the hurt. It felt like someone was stabbing a steak knife in my hip in an attempt to get it lodged in there to stay put while I was running. War games were playing in my head. My rational self begged me to stop while my stubborn self told myself to push through the pain. PAIN IS TEMPORARY. Pain is Temporary. Pain is temporary.

This is when I recognized that the conversation I had with my doctor the other day was not hogwash. I had originally thought that the doctor wanted to err on the side of surgery because that’s profit in his pocket…and although he showed me evidence of why it was needed, I couldn’t believe it.

So let’s backtrack…

Monday I went to a specialist who would perform my right hip labral tear surgery. I visited with him to discuss the results in greater detail, determine the necessity of it and if required, schedule the date of surgery. When I met with Dr. P he promptly asked me if I knew my results. I assured him I did. He said okay, tell me what you know. I explained the tear in quick breath. He advised me that I was misinformed. He followed it up and instructed me to lie down on my back because he wanted to contort my body to feel how my hip would react.

Okay. I felt friction.

After a few awkward leg placements and my right hip popping disturbingly he sat me up. The friction dulled to intermittent blunt pain. He inquired if the positions hurt. I said to a degree but it was tolerable and felt more like my hip was catching onto something. He appeared to be in disbelief and said I have a high pain tolerance.

He had me take a seat next to him by the computer. Images of my hip flashed on the screen. I recall thinking, “Great. What good is this shit…I can’t read it. It’s my hip. Woo freaking hoo. What’s atypical about it?”
That’s when Dr. P starts explaining my condition.

Guess what…

I don’t have a right hip labral tear from running…NOPE. That’s the secondary condition from running. The primary condition is severe Femoracetabular Impingement (FAI) or better known as hip impingement with a number of bone cysts coupled with a large labral tear. Ouchies!

To explain I’d like to compare it to relationships. When something is good for you it shouldn’t hurt, right? But like most relationships friction arises. How do you get past the friction—especially when the relationship works for the most part?

This is my conundrum.

Running, parallel to me and my relationships with people have become old faithful to each other. SO why is it turning on me? Is it bored with my antics, my conversation, my very essence? Have I nagged about the pain and discomfort for too long? Have we become like security blankets devoid of true companionship?

I have exercised integrity with running. I have even applied the attraction principle—a little bit of distance and silence… I thought that should have done the trick (back in April). Running post-discovery of the labral tear robbed me of my confidence but reassured me when I picked it back up that distance and silence were golden gifts—the catalysts that helped me find my speed. A BQ was SOOOOO in my future, like tomorrow!!! So where did I go wrong? Did I even go wrong? Why are we breaking up?

My running relationship akin to that of real relationships has caused literal friction. My hip impingement basically means that the pain I’be felt since I was about 3 years old in gymnastics and forward was due to my ball (femoral head) and socket (acetabulum) rubbing abnormally creating damage to my hip joint. Apparently, compliments of my genetic makeup, my femoral head is too big for the socket (that’s what she said – I had too…sorry!). All my complaints of the rubbing, crushing, clicking, catching, sanding and popping sensations in my hip have a real physiology — for that I am relieved.

I’m suffering with the reality of my diagnosis because I’m used to getting what I put in on and off the path. I like to gain what I’ve earned. I recognize obstacles come up and trust me I know them well. I overcome them. I am happy to run through them with all my might — my whole 5’2” stature. But now I won’t be able to run through this one. Did I earn this discomfort because I was putting in the miles and speed to earn a BQ?

The surgery is going to require Dr. P to complete an arthroscopic procedure. He will shave my femoral head down to a size that accommodates the socket. During the arthroscopy he will repair and clean out the damage to the labrum and articular cartilage as well as shave off the cysts. Ugh!

Dr. P told me because of my 5’2” frame and being moderately thin that it is highly likely I will have a difficult recovery because my body won’t be able to compensate for the excessive swelling. Oh boy. He’s telling me to expect a 6-9 month recovery.

WHAT!?

I asked him immediately when I can start running…he laughed. He told me I might be able to jog sooner but he can’t give me a definitive timeline. I’m troubled because I don’t know what jogging is.

My point is the friction is real. I can choose to either work through the friction to find a resolution (surgery) or wash my hands of it. Some relationships are best ended. Truth. Not this one. If you’re like me and chose to work through the friction I hope you reap the rewards of fighting through the discomfort because you want it so madly!

Relationships are unpredictable (have you met running?). Some are safe. Some are monotonous. Some have explosive sparks (hello wildly inappropriate girl talk). Some are bound by magnetism. Some are boring, abusive, codependent, selfish and proprietary. Whatever relationship you find yourself in, running, platonic, romantic, I urge you to see the opportunities disguised as friction.

I believe there is an opportunity to BQ despite the diagnosis…just not as soon…

The BQ qualifying door may be shut for 2015 but I recognize that although I have been rejected from what I wanted, I’m being re-directed to something better. Find comfort in friction. Make it a friend. After all, to date it’s been a long-lasting friend helping me to discover that it all isn’t really that random — you can fuck up entirely along the way, you can play the wrong sport and not get that D1 scholarship, date the wrong people, marry the wrong person, invest in the wrong stock, train too hard and get injured…but you end up exactly where you need to be.

Cheers to friction. May it continue to unfold in all your relationships and may you find its remarkably uncanny backdrop in crises to be the driver of your greatest revelations.

How do you handle friction? What have your experiences been with sports/running injuries and how have you rehabilitated?

Valerietoth_Runnergirl

Featured Posts

Yesterday marked my first run after work postpartum. I set out to sweat but also to quickly return home to be with my babes. . . . . I woke at 4:30a. Bus to metro to work by 6:45a. Returned home at 6p ish. Showered my baby girl with kisses, squishes, and cuddles (a proven […]

Hello lovelies!!! . . . Happy Weekend! Yay!!! . . . . Today I am 73 days postpartum. I was given the green light to start running, I mean training, for a fall marathon by my OB on July 11. It took a whole 8 weeks to be cleared to run after our baby girl […]

Hello lovelies!!!. . . .My days are numbered being at home with my little babe. The longest I’ve been away from her has been during my runs which is about 1-2.5 hours. So with Monday on the horizon, my heart is sinking. How am I supposed to go back to work? How can I juggle […]